Burning Friends
by AntiBellum
Summary: What if Jenna didn't get kidnapped in the Sol Sanctum? What if Felix never came back? What would happen? Read through this Valeshipped story, and you just may find out.
1. But a Fleeting Memory

Chapter One: But a Fleeting Memory

"Isaac?"

"Yes?" Isaac turned his head to face Jenna, tears dripping down her face, wetting her soft white blouse.

"Are we going to find m-my br-brother? He never even got t-to go to school with the rest of the kids. He... he..." Jenna was clearly on the verge of a mental wall, holding back as much as she could in front of her friends.

Isaac wrapped his arms around Jenna in a large, intimate hug, comforting her with his body warmth. His hand slid down her back to her lower abdomen.

"Everything's going to be all right, Jenna. There's nothing to worry about. We'll find Felix. I promise. You have my word as leader of the party."

"Al-alright." Jenna shied away, and awkwardly walked out of the Newman residence back to her now empty home. As she left, she turned to look at Isaac one last time, and smiled.

"You really have a way with women, don't you Isaac?" Garet appeared from behind, as he tends to do. A lot.

Isaac uttered a very foul profanity as he jumped into the air, nearly soiling his new trousers.

"GARET! Don't sneak up on me like that!"

"But it's so fuuuuun!" Garet laughed, his cheeks dying a rosy red, almost as red as the spiky hair upon his head (which he hadn't washed in four days, for the record).

"What is it Garet?" Isaac sighed.

"Well. I heard from Kraden, you know, that old guy who doesn't belong around here because he totally doesn't know Alchemy and is about three years older than dirt? YEAH! So I heard from him that there's this really hot pad called the 'Soul Sanctum'. He says we can gain really powerful Psynergy if we get the four holy elemental stars there! I call Mars."

"Well Veuns is all mine. I've been waited to learn Hover _all year_." Isaac expressed the length of time by making a large gesture with his hands. Luckily, nobody saw this, as an onlooker might assume Isaac was referring to the size of his intellectual superiority.

"Why? So you can sweep Jenna off her feet?" Garet mocked.

"SHUT UP GARET!" Issac snapped back. He led the way out of the house. "So where is this Soul Sanctum anyway, Garet?"

"It's up to the North, by Kyle's... uh..." Garet cleared his throat, remembering Isaac was sensitive about his father's death, and regretting mentioning it the second it escaped his lips.

"It's okay. It's by his gravestone? You must mean the 'secret path', right?"  
>"Yeah, <em>that<em>. Are you all packed up?" Garet scratched his head.

"Not yet. Would you mind helping me?" Issac answered.

"Fine," Garet groaned before following Issac up to his bedroom. Garet stepped into Issac's chambers and looked around, confused, for he didn't see Issac. Then the door slammed shut and Issac quickly stepped out from the shadows and locked it.

"What are you doing?" Garet asked, confused.  
>"Giving you a little...reward," Issac said with a playful wink. Garet gulped and started to edge towards the locked door.<p>

"Why are you trying to run away?" Isaac asked innocently.  
>"Uh..." Garet said as he grabbed the lock and tried to rip it off of the door handle.<br>"I'm just... checking to see if this door handle is on tight. Yup! Ch-check..." Garet made a weak attempt at a laugh.  
>"Oh, well that's good. I was just going to give you this battle axe I found in the forest. I hear you like big sharp things."<p>

"AXE!" Garet lunged at Isaac, and tackled him to the ground, ripping the axe from his hands. He cuddled it playfully until it shone with a glisten that would make even the hottest Fire Adepts jealous.

"Uh. Let's just pretend that didn't happen and we can still be friends. Anyway, I need you to put all my herbs in our bag. I'll pack us some armor and accessories." Isaac dusted himself off, and dug through his drawers.

"What herbs? The drug kind or the healing kind?" Garet chuckled only half-jokingly.

"Garet." Isaac said promptly. That was pretty much all there was to say on the matter. They finished packing, and headed out without another word. Only when the fresh breeze of the trees, casting dark shadows over the ominous gravestones did meet the cool, smooth stone path leading off to the Sol Sanctum, Garet finally broke the silence.

"I think something bad is going to happen." Garet performed a double-take.

"Why would you say that? Nothing has gone wrong so far. Except, you know, Felix disappearing, half of the village being crushed by a giant boulder, and of course those weird dreams about the _eye thing_ I keep having."

"You're right; I don't know what I was worrying about."

So the two boys continued on their way to the Sol Sanctum, battling the strange monsters that attacked them frequently, and training to use their Psynergy in harmony with each other. Before they knew it, the bright purple doors of Sol Sanctum were beaming down at them.

"Well, look. We're finally here. Now we just need to get the doors open." Isaac walks up the staircase, and attempts to push the doors open, to no avail. He leans against the door, but it still stays locked tight.

"Garet! Come help me open this door!" Garet turns his attention from his reflection in the sparkling plate at his feet to Isaac, whom he thought to be much less important. Garet walked up the stairs, and braced himself in front of the door. He cracked his knuckles, and prepared to break the hinge.

"Uh… Wait a minute Garet. The uh… door's made of stone. You can't break down the hinges on a-" But Isaac's warning fell on deaf ears. Garet charged straight forward with a cry of victorious valor, right into his wall of pain and misfortune. Also known as the Sol Sanctum doors.

-CRACK-

"Hey Garet! I think you broke the lock!" Isaac got up to examine the doors, ignoring the fact that Garet was lying on the ground softly sobbing.

"Nope. That was my shoulder. And my spirit." Garet didn't take well to being bested by a door.

"Well. I guess it just won't **open**... open… opeeennn…" Isaac's words echoed through the mid-day air. And as if by some magical force, the door swung open, and the Sol Sanctum could be explored for the first time in ten years. Let's just hope there are no crazy puzzles, or anything dumb like that. What kind of person would leave statue puzzles lying around for ten years anyway?

"Here Garet, take this herb. It heals 50 HP." Isaac handed a palm-sized green plant to Garet, who ate it in disbelief of any effect.

"This is isn't going to work, Isaac. Why would a simple herb heal my broken shoul- Hey, my shoulder's fixed!" Garet twists his arm in circular motions; when nothing bad is found, he gets up, nods his head, and follows Isaac into the Sol Sanctum.

"Hey Garet? Do you ever feel you're forgetting something? Like something really important that you know you need to do?" Isaac asked.

**Meanwhile in Vale**

"Hello… Isaac… Garet…" Kraden peeked his head into Isaac's home. "Do you guys want to go to the Sol Sanctum now? It's really cooooool. I know you'll like it."

No one answered him. Even Isaac's mother had left to go to the market, buying a long sword for the turkey they were going to have tonight. She also had to kill the turkey with the long sword so she could have it for dinner tonight. Finally, she would have to clean off the long sword of blood, and return it to the store; it was only a rental.

"Did you guys forget about me again? I'm… uh… I'm still here. GUYS! YOU NEED MY HEEEEEEELP!" Kraden yelled at the sky, attracting the attention of a local atheist group.

_Sol Sanctum_

"Yeah, I get that feeling a lot too. I've learned to ignore it by now." Garet answered Isaac's question. The two headed deeper, into the Sol Sanctum's lobby.

There, they found a startling amount of ornate statues, which looked as if they could be pushed around with ease. Cracks of light shone out from behind some of them. It was if the Gods were testing them, trying to see that if someone could solve their "impossible riddles", they were worthy enough to possess the Elemental Stars. It was unlikely that this was the case; everyone knows Gods don't make their own statues.

"Hey look! It's a cute little slime!" Garet bent down and attempted to pat it on its head. The slime spewed out a corrosive acid, which promptly proceeded to hurt a fuck ton.

Garet cleared his throat. "Well. That only hurt a little… bit…" Garet winced. In a fit of fury, he swung his axe in an overhead motion, sliced right through the middle of the slime's body.

The slime flopped down in two separate pieces on the ground. After Garet sliced through it twice more to ensure it was really dead, one pushed two gelatinous round eye balls up unto its head, and got back up. The other three shortly followed, much to Garet's dismay.

"GOD DAMMIT! STAY! DEAD!" Garet sliced several more times into their squishy green bodies, and lobbed a fireball just to be sure they stayed down. Isaac, during this time has solved the entire room, and is waited for Garet to cross over so they can leave the room.

"…" Isaac remains speechless about Garet's anger issues. All for the better he supposes. As soon as Garet reaches the other end of the room, they open the door and head off into the next chamber. A surprise awaits them.

"Isaac? What are you doing here?" Jenna asks. "I thought you were supposed to go the market with your mother today. Aren't you getting your new armor?" Jenna is standing on a ledge about four feet above Garet and Isaac's heads, preparing to jump across to one on the other side.

"I came here to… uh… look for your brother! Yeah." Isaac lied through his teeth.

"I thought we came here to get that 'eternal power' stuff from the-" Garet was hushed by Isaac. "Why did _you _come here, anyway?" Garet yelled out anyway.

"Well, that's simple! I came with Kraden to study the powers of the Sol Sanctum, and the Elemental Stars hidden deep within its… well, depths." Jenna leaped over our heroes' heads, over to a ledge which unbeknownst to our heroes below had a chest which hid a rather large sum of coins.

"Sounds like a great idea! Why don't we come with you? Where's Kraden?" Isaac had a hard time following where Jenna ran, but he enjoyed the _angle _he got as she jumped over his head.

"Wait…. I don't want to go with Kraden. I already stole his wallet last week. I don't think he'd be very happy to see me. And I also broke his record player. And his favorite record. And I ate all his Herbal Baked Chips." Garet confessed rather profusely.

"Garet, you're a terrible person." Isaac said.

"Yes, yes I am." They both chuckled. "Anyway, we should keep going, I suppose. You don't really want to keep Jenna waiting, do you?"

"Right, right. Let's go on." Isaac shuffled across the watery platforms, being careful not to get Garet too wet. He'd probably dislike it. Jenna waited on the other side of the little creek.

"Alrighty! Let's go see Kraden! I'm sure he'll be glad to see both of you.

"Yeah. Glad is exactly what he'll be." Garet whispered under his breath.


	2. Healed Scars

**Author's Note: I apologize for the long wait between Chapters. There is no appropriate excuse for this inconvenience. Please enjoy Chapter 2, if you still can…**

Chapter 2: Healed Scars

Jenna opened the door to the next room, where Kraden sat quietly in the corner, softly weeping as a large blue rat wielding a trident laughed heartily.

"The monsters aren't real. The monsters aren't real. The monsters aren't real. The monsters aren't real." Kraden chanted to himself. Jenna came over and whacked the vermin on the head, knocking it unconscious. She then rolled the body against the wall, where it wouldn't be in the way.

"Was Kraden always this much of a wimp, or has he soured since he turned like 400?" Garet burnt his way through several Ghouls and Goblins. One of them begged for mercy as her children and spouse were murdered in front of her and burned into a small pile of indistinguishable ash, but Garet and Isaac never bothered to think about how monsters felt when they were being slaughtered, so she just earned herself a large slash in the face and another body onto the ever-growing pile.

"I'm sure he'll be useful to us one day. One day probably not very soon. It's not like he can fight. Or use Psynergy, or do anything that assists us except say cryptic messages that don't make very much sense." Isaac made his way down the hallway to an exit door, clearly labelled 'This is an Exit Door, if you come through this way as an Entrance Door, you have installed your door backwards. Please consult the Sol Sanctum Construction Manual for a solution to this problem – Brick Road'. Isaac pushed open the door to a room filled with low-resolution statues.

"I feel a strange compulsion to carelessly and recklessly push aside these priceless antique artifacts." Isaac said while making a motion towards a statue on the right side of the room.

"Ummm, Isaac, I don't think that's a very goo-" Jenna attempted to start a sentence.

"Hey look, there's a room back here!" Isaac walked over the rubble of a statue he's completely destroyed and heads deeper into the Sol Sanctum, and much, much closer to giving Kraden a conniption.

Isaac stood back in awe and observed the room around him in a manner similar to that of an ape trying to deduce which of his cagemates ate the last banana. Isaac looked at the walls, studied the composition of the bricks, and the wear of the mortar. He looked down at the floor, and the grade of the wooden planks and the resin used to bind. He felt the dirty footprints dragged slowly across the ground leading around a corner and into the next room. After a pain-staking five minutes, he combined the facts to deduce that:

"Someone has been here before us; a pair of mischievous Adepts who want to steal the something from us." Isaac nodded his head and toke lead of his party.

"It toke you _five minutes _to figure that out? Why didn't you just look up and read the sign written in monster blood that says 'Hey Dumbasses, we're here to steal the Elemental Stars, Signed Mystery Red-Haired Chick and Sexy Blue-Haired Dude'?" Garet pointed out the sign by underlining it in even more monster blood.

"Because shut up Garet." Isaac stated sarcastically and continued walking along the maze of a corridor.

"Hey guys look, there's more we- I mean Herbs in these chests! We might need them for our battles to help lessen the pain of our wounds!" Jenna held up a burlap sack full of Herbs.

"That sounds like what Herbs do alright. Medicinal herbs…" Garet hinted.

"Back in my day we didn't have these new-age 'Herbs'. We used potions! And Tonics! Oh, those were the days. I remember the Great Psynergy War of 200 B.C. Of course, I couldn't use Psynergy, so I just…" Kraden started one of his long, boring rants that nobody chose to listen to. Isaac and his party kept walking through the long labyrinth of hallways, with but the light from torches guiding their way through. Eventually, they found a new door which looked like it hadn't been touched in over one hundred years. Of course, it only _looked _like that. It had, of course been touched by Currently Unnamed Villains 1 and 2 just over an hour ago.

Isaac tried to open the door; it was heavy and very thick wood, so he called over Garet to help me push the door in. After several minutes of trying to push the door open, Garet signalled Isaac to take a step back from the door. Within an instance of the door clearing, Garet snapped his fingers and the entire door frame burst into flames.

"WHOA WHOA WHOA! Garet! There's no need to be so careless with our Psynergy! That could have hurt somebody on the other side!" Isaac scolded Garet.

"_Did_ it hurt somebody on the other side?" Garet asked, already knowing the answer.

"Well, no, but-"

"And did it work in getting us through the door?"

Well yes, but I mean-"

"Then I don't see a problem with the way I did it." Garet cocked his head and marched through the ashes of the once fir wood door.

"Hey look, four statues arranged around a moon panel in the floor! I wonder what we should do here." Jenna mentioned, half-sarcastically. Isaac toke it in complete seriousness and attempted to parse a way through the puzzle.

"Uh… we could… uh… perhaps… maybe… GARET! You think for once!"

"We could push them onto these pressure plates and that little moon thing in the middle of the room will probably light up and take us somewhere else. How's that, Isaac?" Garet sighed.

"No, that's stupid… I know! Let's push the statues onto these pressure plates and hope that moon in the middle of the room will take us somewhere!" Isaac exclaimed. Garet proceeded to facepalm before helping the plan out, and doing as Isaac said.

The "plan" goes down without a hitch and the moon lights up like a child's face when he finds out where babies come from.

"Shouldn't it be lighting up more than not at all, Isaac?" Garet pokes the engraving with his battleaxe.

"Probably… Maybe we should make a better simile." Isaac said, leaning on the fourth wall.

"What?"

"Nothing."

Suddenly the moon engraving decided it had been made fun of enough and went ahead and lit itself up.

"Hey, making bad jokes worked!" Jenna pointed at the engraving, and was the first to dive through it.

"Hey, wait! It could be dangerous to go thro-" Isaac was unable to finish that sentence, because he got pushed through to portal by Garet, who followed shortly after him.

"Guys, did you abandon me again? Guys? Aww man… It's just like the time my wife left me when I wouldn't stop ranting about the Great War of 200 BC," Kraden's face saddened, until he thought about what he had just said. "That reminds me, I was once in this war a long time ago called the Great Psynergy War. I met a little guy by the name of Akafubu. You guys might meet him one day. Nice guy, but the thing about him is that he usually-" Garet stepped back through the portal and grabs Kraden by the collar of his robe.

"Come on, old fart, we've got work to do." Garet pulled Kraden through the portal, much to his discontent.

Through the portal was a very large and mostly empty room full of purple crystals that jutted out from the walls, probably Psynergy Crystals, like one Isaac had seen earlier. The portal dropped our heroes on a little ledge, and several smaller ledges surrounded them. Near the corners of this rough cave were four hand-carved statues, each appearing to hold a glowing orb of some kind.

"Who the hell designs a dungeon like this, anyway? There's small platforms we could easily fall off of, leading to what seems like a bottomless pit below us. And for what? FOUR STUPID STARS?" Garet exclaimed, his voice echoed throughout the chamber.

"Now, now Garet. These stars aren't stupid. These stars will give you unlimited power. You can be the master of the Mars Element!" Kraden told Garet, with a very trollish look on his face.

"Really?"

"NOPE!" Kraden guffawed very loudly, for several minutes. His laughing broke into a coughing fit.

"I hate you Kraden." Garet jumped ahead of the group, and headed for the Mars Star.

"Hey, Garet! Wait for me!" Jenna hopped after Garet, and tried to get ahead of the feisty (and somewhat annoying) Fire Adept.

"I guess I'll just go get all the other stars we need for some reason I'm not terribly clear of. Thanks guys." Isaac sighed, sarcastically.

"We need them because I said so and you should respect your elders." Kraden scolded.

Isaac and his party hopped around the dangerously feeble platforms and generally chose to ignore the fact that they could have a single misstep and fall to their death. It was probably a bit better that way.

"I got the Mars Star! Ha!" Jenna held up a glowing red orb over her head while Garet desperately tried to steal it from her. Despite his best efforts, this proved to be futile, because Jenna was very cunning, and slipped it into her bag when Garet wasn't looking.

"I got the Venus and Jupiter Stars. Can you grab the Mercury Star, Garet?" Isaac slipped the purple and yellow orbs into his satchel and pointed at a blue statue lying off in the corner of the room.

"No way, it's a _Mercury _Star! That stuff will kill me! It's all… Watery and… uh… Watery… and… I don't want to get it, okay?" Garet pushed Jenna forward, almost knocking her into the bottomless abyss below him.

"Why do I have to do it? I already got the Mars Star. You should be the one to get the last one! It's only fair that we each get one star, and Isaac gets two because we're lazy and he offered to." Jenna argued.

"Yeah, well you've shown that you're better at getting stars than me, so I think you should just go ahead and grab the last one, too!" Garet responded.

"No way! You're just being a wimp! Go get the last star and stop wasting our time!" Jenna crossed her arms across her chest.

"Hey, uh, team? We might have a bigger problem here…" Kraden backed up to the edge of his platform.

Through the portal came two suspiciously familiar-looking villains, carrying with them a bag, with what appeared to be a very large and somewhat limp content. They put the bag down behind them, and walked up to Kraden, who was sweating profusely.

"Kraden! We're trying to argue over here, stop interrupting us with 'your problems'." Jenna remained angrily fixed on Garet, so much so that she didn't notice Kraden being put into a chokehold, and then forced into submission.

"You know what, screw it! _I'll _get this one; because I don't want to be a burden to Isaac!" Garet stomped away in the direction of the Mercury Star.

Garet hopped across the platforms, while Jenna and Isaac watched. They watched him size up the statue, and trying to punch it in the face, before nearly breaking his fist. Again. He finally grabbed the Mercury Star, put it in his satchel, and jumped back to Jenna and Isaac, who were waiting only a couple platforms away from the portal.

When the team hopped back to the portal platform, they noticed something was off. Something was there that they hadn't noticed before.

"Was Kraden always being forced into submission by these familiar looking villainous people?" Isaac questioned Garet.

"Hmmm… No, I think it's new. What should do about it?" Garet responded in complete seriousness.

"Do we have to do anything about it?"

"I suppose we don't. Let's keep on walking then! Nothing to see here!"

"Guys, we can't just leave him here!" Jenna nagged.

"I don't see a problem with leaving him here." Isaac said with a shrug.

"He might die."

Isaac paused for a moment. "I don't see a probl-" He began.

"Isaac!"

"Fiiiine. What do you guys want for him?"

"Give us the Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, and Venus Stars, and we _may _consider letting him go." The slightly attractive red-haired villain chuckled. The team did as they said, and handed over their hard-earned Stars to the evil-doers.

"And with that, we'll be leaving!" Blue-Haired Bro pulled Kraden through the portal.

"WAIT!" Jenna screamed. "I know where I recognize you from, now. You were the ones who kidnapped my brother on that chilly January night, four years ago. W-Where is he now?" Jenna voiced shook like a Hawaiian hula dancer on the night of her first luau.

"Ohohohohohooo… You want to know where we put him?" An evil smirk came across Red-Haired Chick's face. "You're looking at him." She zipped open the bag laying on the ground, and threw out Felix's limp body.

"Feeeeellliiiiiiixx!" Jenna dove for her long-lost brother's limp body, lying on the cold stone platform.

Red-Haired Chick kicked his body to the side, and it fell over the edge. "Oops. My bad." She chuckled coyly.

"F-F-F-Felix! Noooooooooooooo!" Jenna ran to the end of the platform, and jumped headfirst into the bottomless pit, after her brother.

"J-Jenna! Wha- what are you doing? Stooooooooooop!" Isaac jumped in after her.

Red-Haired Chick and Garet were the only ones left standing on the platform. It was very awkward for Garet. "Uuuuhhh…" Garet slowly toke off his bag, and threw it into the bottomless pit after his friends. "I uh… forgot my baaaaaaaaaaag!" Garet dove in after it.

"Ha. Stupid children." Red-Haired Chick walked back through the portal.

Isaac and his gang continued to free fall towards what still appeared to be a bottomless pit. But no one knew how long it would stay that way…

**Author's Note: Thank you for reading Chapter Two of my story. I, again apologize for the long wait between Chapter One and Two. I will try to write these stories on a weekly basis, usually releasing a chapter every Saturday morning. So now you have something to look forward to! Again, thanks for reading, and if you really liked it, please leave a review!**


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